Cloudy storage new-kid Nirvanix loses CEO Genereux to Oracle

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Enterprise cloud storage supplying start-up Nirvanix has appointed Dru Borden as its CEO, replacing Scott Genereux who has left to join Oracle.

Dru Borden became Nirvanix' chief strategy officer in July this year. A new VP of worldwide sales, Tina Gravel, was appointed recently and has caused some turmoil in the sales ranks as some sales heads were ousted.

At that time marketing VP Steve Zivanic said Nirvanix was moving to a "a fully managed services business model."

When Genereux was appointed CEO, replacing Jim Zierick, it coincided with a $10 million funding round. We don't suppose the VCs are happy at this latest move.

Genereux' LinkedIn entry says he is Oracle's SVP of global hardware strategy, planning and product management from this month. His "responsibilities include strategy for all infrastructure platforms—including servers, storage, networking and Oracle Engineered Systems such as Exadata and Exalogic."

Genereux came to Nirvanix from QLogic, where he was SVP for sales and marketing, and prior to that DataDirect Networks, where he was SVP for sales, marketing and support. Before that he was EVP for sales, marketing and support at HDS.

Zivanic said "Scott Genereux decided to make a career change and join a large publicly traded company."

He confirmed that:

The Nirvanix Board has appointed Dru Borden, Chief Strategy Officer of Nirvanix, as its new CEO. The appointment became effective Monday of this week. The Board has been extremely pleased with Dru’s performance this year and is confident in his ability to lead the company based on his extensive knowledge of the cloud space and his relationships with large enterprise customers, particularly in Nirvanix’s largest vertical, the media and entertainment sector.

It doesnt seem like a temporary measure, Zivanic adding: "The company decided to appoint a proven technologist to lead it through its next stage of evolution. The appointment of Dru to CEO will enable the company to accelerate its technology advancements in strategic areas such as healthcare, finance and media & entertainment.

"For 2012, Nirvanix is on track to double its revenue and more than double its monthly recurring revenue (MRR) and is currently adding new skill sets in its sales organization from the managed services industry."

El Reg wonders why Genereux would leave a CEO role at a hot startup, presumably loaded with stock options, to become a mere SVP at Oracle? Why on earth should be want an SVP's title again? It doesn't make sense.

His LinkedIn entry says he is "currently" Oracle's SVP etc. Could "currently" indicate another position is going to become his soon?

It appears Genereux walked from Nirvanix this month and immediately joined Oracle, so the move has been planned and he hasn't been suddenly fired by Nirvanix.

At Oracle ex-Sun guy John Fowler is EVP for systems and Genereux' role appears to overlap Fowler's, which Oracle describes as being: "responsible for the delivery of all Sun systems products, including SPARC and x64-based servers, as well as networking and disk and tape storage products. Additionally, he is responsible for systems software, including Oracle Solaris."

Does Genereux report to Fowler and look after strategy? Is Fowler on the way out? Time will tell. ®